Not such a merry Christmas after all
by gemstone1234
Summary: Sherlock has heightened senses making Christmas a difficult time for him. There's all the colours and smells. And then there's John's jumper which is made of wool and Sherlock really cannot stand wool.


_Greetings to all my readers. Before I begin I would just like to wish you all a merry Christmas. I will warn you this fic is fairly angsty (not surprising considering it is me) so it's not particularly Christmassy. Personally I'm up for angst no matter the time of year so I did try to give it a Christmas theme. Its not my best piece of work but I liked writing it so I'm just going to roll with it. And for those of you who have made the very easy mistake of thinking I own Sherlock I hate to break it to you but I don't. However, it is Christmas and Mr Moffat is yet to give me a Christmas present so you never know… All I can say is that if I did come to own Sherlock I would hurry up and make series 3, just saying. _

_I hope you enjoy this fic and the drill is the same as normal. First of all you read the fic and then you drop a review *hint hint*. A review would be the best Christmas present you guys could give me (unless you can actually give me Sherlock/the completed version of series 3)._

**Not such a merry Christmas after all**

Sherlock did not like Christmas, it was as simple as that. Well, no, it wasn't as simple as that but he hated having to try and explain it to people. Mycroft knew, Mycroft had witnessed a childhood where an already introverted Sherlock locked himself away in his room and refused to leave it for the whole of December. The only time he did leave was when his father went in and had to manhandle him out of the room. The slightly rough physical contact made the young boy cry out in pain. Mr Holmes was a caring man, he was a good parent, and the cries of pain which came from his youngest child at Christmas time broke his heart.

Sherlock hated Christmas. The normal world was painful for him but he could control it, distract himself with the work and when there were no cases he would not leave the flat. At Christmas there were rarely cases, it was usually only boring domestic violence cases going on. Boring was not enough of a distraction, boring did not protect him from the bright colours, loud noises and the rich smells and flavours of Christmas.

He nearly lost it when he saw John's Christmas jumper. It was made of wool and the feeling of wool against his skin caused him a lot of pain. Silk and cotton was pretty much the only material he could stand to feel against his skin hence all of the expensive shirts. On a bad day he couldn't even stand those materials. The bright colours of the jumper made him feel nauseated. The musty smell of wool overwhelmed him and he couldn't stand to be near his best friend. The worst thing was that the detective knew that if he told John about his heightened senses he would get rid of the jumper, he would dispose of the bright decorations and colourful lights and he would have no special food in for Christmas.

However, he did not tell the doctor who would understand. Part of the reason was that he didn't want John to know, he didn't want anyone to know. It was embarrassing that the sound of chewing almost made him scream but he quite liked seeing corpses. This wasn't out of some twisted enjoyment of seeing humans lying dead but because there was no real sensory input from a corpse. They are so pale and Sherlock can manage pale colours, it's the bright ones that give him a migraine. Corpses are silent and corpses don't touch you. The only problem with corpses was that if left for too long they did begin to smell so the detective made sure that he only ever dealt with the fresh corpses.

The other reason he did not tell was his best friend was for a reason he would not admit. He cared about John more than the man would ever know, just as a friend but the relationship that they had could very much be mistaken for a brotherly one (not the sort he had with Mycroft but a real bond). Christmas made John so happy and Sherlock liked it when John was happy, he wouldn't take the enjoyment from the doctor. Rather he decided just to shut himself away in his room when the stimulus was too much, and this occurred a week before Christmas.

Two days after Sherlock's mysterious disappearance John got worried. If he was honest he worried about Sherlock constantly, in this he could sympathise with the elder Holmes brother. Sometimes he worried for the man's mental wellbeing, sometimes his physical but most commonly he worried about both. Sherlock was skinny, of this he was far too aware of this and the fact the younger man had not emerged from his room in a couple of days, and before that he had been on a case, he really needed to get some food into his friend. It was not his intention to spend Christmas in a hospital room watching Sherlock being fed through a tube when he refused to actually eat.

Gently he knocked on the door. "Sherlock, are you awake?" There was the sound of someone moving about in bed sheets but there was nothing else to indicate John had been heard. "Sherlock, I hear you moving about, I know you're awake. I've made you some soup, you really need to eat something." Yet again there was no response. Enough was enough and John simply opened the door and walked into the darkened room. The light from the hallway burst in and the detective rapidly turned away from the door away from the brightness. "Are you ok mate?" John asked curiously, setting the bowl of soup down and approaching Sherlock cautiously. No response. There was something wrong.

The man who usually wore such fine clothes, even when he was dressed casually, was lying on the bed, curled up away from the light, and was wearing nothing but a pair of underwear. This in itself did not faze John; he was a doctor after all. What did faze him was the sight of pointy bones where healthily curved joints should have been. "Are you ill Sherlock?" he was met by a stony silence. "Because you should really tell me if you are, I am a doctor after all." Gently he sat on the bed next to his best friend and place a palm on his forehead to gauge if Sherlock had a temperature.

The moment John touched his skin and he felt the wool brush against him he couldn't help his reaction. "No! Get off of me, don't touch me!" he shouted pushing John off him and he careered into the wall behind him stunned at the sudden violent outburst. "Leave now!" Shouted Sherlock trying very hard to control the nausea that was welling up in his stomach. The doctor did not obey but rather attempted to placate the detective.

"Calm down Sherlock? What's wr…?" He didn't get to finish the sentence as Sherlock instead dashed towards the bathroom and locked the door behind him.

There was a few seconds of silence before John's phone started to buzz. He already knew who it was, there was only one person who could possibly already know. Under normal circumstances he would not answer the phone to Mycroft but this was not ordinary and the elder Holmes would probably be able to help. "Care to enlighten me to what the hell is going on here Mycroft Holmes?"

"I'd be delighted; I'll be there in a few minutes. If you want Sherlock to reappear get rid of that ghastly jumper you're wearing and assure him you won't touch him."

"What? Why?"

"Patience Dr Watson, I will explain when I arrive."

Reluctantly John removed the jumper Sarah had made him, bristling when he realised the British government had referred to it as ghastly. However he did not manage to coax Sherlock out of the bathroom and he was pretty sure he heard the man retching, not that much would come up anyway.

As Mycroft assured John he did arrive pretty quickly. "How is he Dr Watson?" he whispered. John cocked an eyebrow curious as to the reason for the hushed voices but thought it best to follow Mycroft's example.

"I think he's trying to be sick and I can't get him to come out. What's going on?"

"Let's get Sherlock sorted and then I'll explain." John nodded and the two men turned their attention to the closed door.

"It's me, Mycroft," he said tapping on the door gently with the handle of the umbrella.

There was a brief pause and then a voice came from the bathroom, it was so quiet it could hardly be recognised as the detective's. "It's too bright Mycroft."

"Come back through to your bedroom. We'll keep the door closed and it'll be nice and dim."

"Don't let him touch me, it hurts," came the feeble voice again.

"Don't worry, the jumper is gone." There was a delay of about a minute before the toilet flushed and the door was slowly unlocked to reveal a very pained looking detective.

"Sherlock," John gasped. The detective ignored him and instead hurried to his bedroom, the other two men followed and the door was swiftly shut. "Please, will someone tell me what is going on here?" John asked, desperate to know what was wrong with his friend.

"No," whispered Sherlock, curled up once again on his bed.

"Quietly John," ordered Mycroft and the doctor nodded. "Come on Sherlock," Mycroft continued. "It's ridiculous he doesn't know already and it's quite a problem now that he doesn't. Christmas could be so much easier if you only told him."

"Told me what?" The two men looked at Sherlock who seemed to feel their gaze and eventually gave up.

"Ok."

"Thank you brother. I promise you nothing bad will come of this. Well, Dr Watson, when Sherlock was very little he was diagnosed with sensory defensiveness…"

_So let me know what you think. If people want me to I can make this into a two-shot instead of a one-shot. Let me know what you think guys so I know whether or not to carry this on. Thanks for reading. _


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